The line at the Music Hall stretched around the block. “Who knew so many people wanted to see an astronaut?” someone behind me said. Lots, apparently, since the illustrated talk by astronaut Scott Kelly was a sold out performance in 2018. Kelly had spent a total of 520 days away from planet Earth, the longest of any American astronaut at the time. [Update:Peggy Whitson has since topped that record with 695 days in space.]
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Kelly looked darn good for a 54-year-old spaceman despite the minor side effects from 340 consecutive days aboard the International Space Station, a single-mission endurance record for an American. A retired U.S. Navy Captain and veteran of four space flights, Kelly commanded the Portsmouth audience for an hour. In these trying days of devastating daily news reports, watching a real live hero tell candid tales with modesty and humor was a treat.
When the video introduction to Kelly’s live interview ran into technical problems, the audience giggled nervously. “Houston, we have a problem,” someone muttered, and we all cracked up. Kelly’s talk was also the launch of his book, Infinite Wonder, a collection of photographs taken while orbiting the Earth while traveling at five miles per second. The person sitting in front of me had purchased four copies of the oversized autographed hardcover book and was balancing them on her lap. Kelly’s first book, Endurance: My Year in Space, was also on sale. After his talk, the line to meet the man from outer space seemed almost infinite. The astronaut appeared as part of the Innovation + Leadership series at the Music Hall, designed to showcase opinion leaders, authors and a variety of educators.
Scott Kelly, for the record, was not my first astronaut. Pictured above is a shot from the Robinson family scrapbook. It proves, more or less, that I was on hand in when New Hampshire’s own Alan B. Shepard’s motorcade passed through Manchester, NH. This was after his famous flight on May 5, 1961. My brother Brian and I waited with a crowd to catch a glimpse of a man who had spent 15 minutes in space. A decade later, Shepard walked on the moon.
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It isn’t easy to explain, but as hundreds of people found out at the Music Hall, there’s something hopeful about simply being in the room with a person who has lived in outer space. Kelly told tales of being a terrible student in school, about the sometimes grossness and loneliness of living off-planet. What he missed most during a year in space, he told the Portsmouth audience, was weather. Arriving home after a year without a shower, he jumped into his swimming pool fully clothed.
He was floating above the Earth when he learned his sister-in-law politician Gabby Gifford, married to his twin brother Mark Scott, had been shot in the head by a gunman.
Kelly’s message was twofold. First, he hoped to inspire people to step outside their comfort zone and to become good at something, no matter how difficult the journey. Second, as his photographs taken aboard the International Space Station flashed on a large screen, Kelly noted what incredible things can be accomplished when people from different nations work together. Both messages seemed especially important today. If I have to say why, then you’re not reading the news.
(c) J. Dennis Robinson, all rights reserved.
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